Baxter storms season's last hill

VSCC I Loton Park I Sept 25-26

With Mac Hulbert and R4D absent, James Baxter was always likely to be the man to beat as the VSCC hillclimb season wrapped up. Sure enough, he urged his Frazer Nash single-seater to the top of the Shropshire hill to claim FTD – but only by a fifth of a second.

Baxter served notice by getting to within half a second of Hulbert’s record in practice, but was a little over a second shy of the ERA’s 2003 best when it mattered. That 63.4sec climb was still fast enough, however, to fend off a strong challenge from Goff Tidball in ERA R14B, who was only 0.25sec down on the pacesetter.

Sitting high and exposed, and urging the Parker-GN Special along at a fearsome rate, Richard Scaldwell set fastest vintage time in the 6-litre, 80-year-old monster. However, the crowd’s biggest cheers were reserved for Duncan Pittaway (GN Vitesse) and Mark Walker (GN Thunderbug) who attacked the hill in typically outrageous sideways style.

Graham Beckett (Austin 7 Sports) and Will Mahany (HRG Le Mans) both set new class records, while Michael Windsor-Price (Ford Model T) topped the automobile-engined Edwardian class: David Baker headed the aero-engined division with his beautifully presented Piccard-Pictet.

Finally, Michael Fitzmaurice stormed the hill in his supercharged Austin 7 racer to claim another class win, but missed out on breaking his own record by a quarter of a second. This is my favourite hill.” said Fitzmaurice.